It's becoming a results business for the Boston Bruins
Bruce Cassidy's last unfiltered words in reference to Jake DeBrusk were something to the effect, "The puck's got to start going in some time."
His answer to a question about his decision to sit out DeBrusk and Erik Haula for Sunday night's much-needed victory over Vancouver included nothing about we want them to see the game from a different angle (125 feet from the rink) or the learning curve, none of the above.
Last weekend, the 2021-22 season became a results business for the Montreal Canadiens. The Habs are cleaning house and, only five months removed from a Cinderella run to the Stanley Cup final, have hired former Boston Bruins bridge boss Jeff Gorton to oversee a massive reset.
Heads will roll, many. And, don't look now, but it's fast becoming a results business here, too.
The way this works is bottoms-up, both at the rink and, if things go poorly, at the other place that comes to mind.
Hockey-wise, it first means that the players who don't deliver will not play. The ramifications are volatile. DeBrusk's agent confirmed on Monday that the winger has asked for a trade.
Sunday's much-needed win over the Canucks had barely been digested by the time the league's Department of Player Safety announced that Brad Marchand has been suspended three games for slew-footing defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson. The Bruins had Detroit at home on Tuesday, are at Nashville on Thursday, and then face the Lightning on Saturday night in Boston.
Speculation abounds as to whether Marchand's suspension is a make-up call for crossing the verbal line with Rangers winger Artemi Panarin, after which the Russian superstar earned a $5,000 fine for hurling a hockey glove at the Boston winger while both were on their respective benches.
Will Cassidy miss having Marchand, whose third-period power surge saved the Vancouver game? "He's our best player, plays I think the most minutes of any forward on our team. You hope (his aggression) rubs off on other guys."
Think he meant the two players he sat out of that game? I do.
Oh, and the Bruins announced Tuesday morning that Cassidy had gone into Covid protocol and would not be coaching against the Red Wings.
So it's going to be one of those years.
It would seem so.
As for DeBrusk, Cassidy's pre-pandemic mantra had been, when the puck is not going in, Jake needs to show us a "B" or at least a "C" game.
The irony here is that the winger's "B" game was arguably looking B+ in recent days. DeBrusk had begun holding onto the puck longer, fending off contact and making solid, smart hockey plays, creating in the attacking zone and competing elsewhere.
Even measured against his first couple of seasons when he'd go stealth two periods at a time and somehow score on a 25-goal goal pace, this recent stretch has been DeBrusk's best two-way hockey to date. At least until Black Friday's team-wide collapse against the Rangers on national TV.
Aside from even more grief coming General Manager Don Sweeney's way in the wake of the regrettable 2015 entry draft (that did yield Brandon Carlo in the second round), the DeBrusk coddling by management and coach in the aftermath of his 2021 no-show came to an abrupt end at an odd time.
Crickets on Sunday's benching of 2021 free-agent signee (and fellow no-show) Haula, except for however much it moved the needle on the meter measuring the rumbles under the GM's feet.
Sweeney got this opportunity after the fault line opened up and swallowed Peter Chiarelli, his Cup-winning predecessor. The Bruins missed the 2015 playoffs, which incidentally was the capper to the last season that the franchise went this many games without David Krejci (hip) and Zdeno Chara (knee) in their lineup.
The salary-cap hardships that befell Chiarelli are a common aftermath to championships, but a lousy haul in the 2013 Tyler Seguin trade coupled with dwindling opportunities to draft from the elite class begot a roster erosion with which the Bruins, minus Chara and minus Krejci for over a month each, could not cope.
Seven seasons later (and three seasons beyond that fateful Game 7 loss to St. Louis), Sweeney is banking on the emergence of prospects such as center Jack Studnicka to offset the NHL retirement of Krejci, who made a family decision last summer to play out the string in his native Czech Republic.
Sweeney's only playoff miss is his entry year (2015-16). Can he survive a second miss in 2021-22?
Technically, that's up to team president Cam Neely to decide, but it would be naive to think Delaware North Boston Holdings Principal Charlie Jacobs will idly stand by and let this unfold without a word, especially after the hit the family business took as a world-wide industry leader in an entertainment-concessions business severely pinched by pandemic-related cancelations and shutdowns.
The mood is souring on and off the ice.
The Bruins may be a tiny piece of the empire, but they are the apple of the old man's eye. Make no mistake, being but an assemblage of X-factors at too many critical positions to make them immune to the pitfalls of the NHL's broad middle class is not good enough.
Perhaps a DeBrusk trade can be expanded to help land the franchise that left-shot stalwart defender that they've missed since time caught up with Chara.
Jobs may depend on it.
Mick Colageo writes about hockey for The Standard-Times. Follow on Twitter @MickColageo.